The shaky science behind lion’s mane coffee – the new Gen Z health drink ...Middle East

Forget probiotics, protein shakes or kombucha – the latest health drink is based on mushrooms, with one of the most popular products a fungus called lion’s mane.

Claimed to improve focus, lion’s mane extract is increasingly sold in the form of coffees, teas, or powders for adding to drinks at home.

You can even buy mushroom-growing kits for those whose appetite for it knows no bounds.

But perhaps we shouldn’t be too hasty. Scientists say that the evidence behind lion’s mane and other mushrooms is weak. So, what do and don’t we know about the so-called functional fungi?

The craze for lion’s mane, a large white mushroom with long dangling spines, seems to have stemmed from its use in traditional Chinese medicines as a tonic to improve mood and relieve stress.

Studies in animals have shown that the fungus contains two groups of compounds, called erinacines and hericenones, which boost levels of a brain signalling molecule called BDNF.

BDNF is generally seen as beneficial, with animal studies showing that it supports the survival and growth of brain cells. This has led to the idea that lion’s mane is good for the brain and could even combat Alzheimer’s disease.

But in order for a manufacturer to make specific health claims about a food, there need to be several large trials in people showing a benefit, said Bridget Benelam, a scientist at the British Nutrition Foundation. “There is no approved claim for lion’s mane,” she said.

Instead, its sellers tend to make vaguer promises, usually along the lines that it helps to balance mood, reduce stress, and banish brain fog – itself an ill-defined term medically.

The trouble is that the evidence is far too weak to make such claims, experts have said.

“Collectively their results are unconvincing, in my view,” said Professor Edzard Ernst, a professor of complementary medicine at the University of Exeter, and a long-time critic of non-evidence-based medicines.

Animal studies cannot be relied on to draw conclusions about what happens in humans, added Professor Kevin McConway, a statistician at the Open University. “On their own, they don’t show anything.”

There have been a few trials of lion mane’s in people, but they have generally been small, involving only a few dozen participants, and their results have been unconvincing, said Dr Ellen Smith, a nutritional researcher at Northumbria University.

Smith led one such trial herself, where capsules with 1.8g of the mushroom extract were compared with placebo versions in 41 healthy adults.

People were given a range of cognitive tests one hour after taking the tablet, and at the end of four weeks, to test short-term and long-term effects.

Those who got the capsules that contained the extract did better in one reaction time test. But there was no difference in five other types of thinking test. “If we are expecting that people are improving on speed of performance, then we would expect to see it across more tasks,” said Dr Smith.

Misleading results

A BBC article earlier this year highlighted a Taiwan trial in 41 people with mild Alzheimer’s, which claimed the mushroom had shown neurocognitive benefit.

But this is misleading, as the study involved testing people in several different ways, with some results negative, said McConway. If statistical techniques had been used to assess all the data together, the overall result would probably not have been positive, he added.

Another problem is that even if lion’s mane does have a benefit, it is still unclear how big a dose is needed. The doses used in studies have ranged from half a gramme to 10g per day.

It is no use hoping to boost your alertness with a coffee that contains half a gramme of lion’s mane if the human body needs 10g to have a noticeable effect.

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Some products are mushroom “blends” that are mixtures of several different fungi. With these, the amount of lion’s mane in the powder is likely to be lower than with pure extract.

“A real issue is we don’t have any kind of concrete data in humans to suggest what dose might be most efficacious,” said Smith.

“The research is really, really limited at the moment. There needs to be a lot more evidence in place before we can start making the kinds of claims that we’re seeing.”

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